The short answer
Scripture addresses homosexual practice in a handful of passages and reads it as falling outside God’s design for sexual union, yet it speaks of same-sex attraction itself with far more care than the culture war usually allows — and it never, anywhere, treats a person as beyond God’s love. The Bible distinguishes between an attraction a person did not choose and the desires and actions a person embraces; it places sexual sin alongside pride, greed and self-righteousness rather than in a category of its own; and it insists that every human being is made in God’s image and loved without condition. The question is not whether God loves people who experience same-sex attraction — he does, fully — but what his design for love and sexuality actually is, and how each of us brings our whole life into it.
This is among the hardest and most-asked questions of the moment. At Passion 2026, a conference drawing tens of thousands of young adults, organisers said sexuality was one of the questions students raised most, alongside the existence of God and the problem of suffering (Christian Post). It deserves an answer that is honest about Scripture, warm toward every person, and grounded in a clear vision of why God made us as sexual beings at all. That is what this piece attempts, drawing on the Bible and on the Divine Principle’s understanding of love, lineage and God’s purpose of creation.
What Scripture actually says
The Bible speaks directly about homosexual practice in only a handful of texts, and the historic reading of them is that such acts fall outside God’s design for sexual union between a man and a woman. The passages usually cited are Leviticus 18:22 and 20:13 in the Law, Romans 1:26–27 in Paul’s account of a world that turned from its Creator, and 1 Corinthians 6:9–10 and 1 Timothy 1:9–10 in his lists of behaviours at odds with the kingdom. Across the centuries the mainstream of the church has understood these to mean that sexual union is designed for the covenant of a man and a woman, and that homosexual acts fall short of that design.
Two things must be held alongside that reading, because Scripture holds them. First, these texts speak of practice — what people do — far more than of involuntary attraction; as one widely used summary notes, “the Bible explicitly says that impenitent homosexual acts, not homosexual desires, keep a person from inheriting the kingdom of God” (Desiring God, on 1 Corinthians 6:9–10). Second, every list in which these behaviours appear sets them beside greed, slander, drunkenness and pride — failings common to us all — and then says, astonishingly, “and such were some of you. But you were washed.” The Bible’s tone is not condemnation of a particular group but the universal offer of restoration. For how to read such passages carefully rather than as weapons, see how we should read the Bible.
Attraction, desire and action
A distinction many Christians find essential is the one between an attraction a person did not choose to feel, a desire that is consciously nursed, and an action that is embraced. Scripture does not treat temptation itself as sin — if it did, no one could be innocent, and Jesus, who “in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin” (Hebrews 4:15), could not be our example. A person can experience same-sex attraction without having chosen it and without having sinned in merely experiencing it. The moral question, as with every attraction any of us feels, is what we then do with it — whether we cultivate it toward what God forbids or offer it to God to be shaped by his design.
This matters pastorally because the opposite assumption — that the attraction itself makes a person guilty, or defines them — crushes people under a weight Scripture never places on them. It confuses a temptation with a transgression, and an experience with an identity. The Bible’s way is gentler and more honest: it takes temptation seriously without treating the tempted person as fallen beyond reach, and it calls everyone, of every orientation, to the same thing — to bring the whole self, desires included, under the love and lordship of God. On the difference between the longing we inherit and the choices we own, see what the original mind is and why Jesus was tempted in the wilderness.
Every person bears God’s image
Before anything is said about conduct, Scripture says something about worth: every human being is made in the image of God and is loved by him without condition. This is not a footnote to the subject but its foundation. A person who experiences same-sex attraction is not a problem to be solved or a category to be managed; they are a son or daughter whom God made, knows by name and desires with his whole heart. As one careful ministry puts it, God loves those who experience same-sex attraction, and his desire “for them, and for everyone, is that they would know true life through his son.” Any approach that forgets this has already departed from the Bible, whatever verses it quotes.
That is why contempt, mockery and exclusion are not merely bad manners but a betrayal of the gospel. Bullying or shaming anyone on the basis of their sexuality is always wrong, and the church that does so misrepresents the God it claims to serve. The challenge is to hold two things at once that the surrounding culture insists are opposites: clarity about God’s design and tenderness toward every person. Scripture never asks us to choose between them. It models a love that tells the truth and a truth that is never told without love. On that difficult but essential posture, see how we love people we disagree with and what it means to be made in God’s image.
God’s design for sexuality
To understand what Scripture says about any expression of sexuality, you first have to understand what sexuality is for — and the Bible treats it as one of the most sacred things God made, not a trivial appetite. From the opening chapters of Genesis, the union of man and woman is tied to three things: the completion of mature love, the bringing forth of life, and a family line through which God’s blessing passes to the next generation. “Male and female he created them,” and he blessed them to “be fruitful and multiply.” Sexuality, in this vision, is the meeting place of love, family and lineage — which is exactly why Scripture surrounds it with such care, and why it cannot be treated as a matter of preference alone.
Seen this way, the Bible’s teaching on sexuality is not a list of prohibitions but the protection of something precious. The question it puts to all of us — married or single, whatever our attractions — is the same: will we hold our sexuality as a sacred trust aimed at God’s purposes, or as a private possession aimed at our own fulfilment? That is a question for every person, and almost no one finds it easy. The call to bring our desires into God’s design is costly across the board; it is not a burden laid only on some. For the fuller picture of why God made us this way, see why God created us as sexual beings and God’s design for marriage.
The Divine Principle view
The Divine Principle deepens this by teaching that God created human beings as man and woman so that their love could complete God’s purpose of creation, reflect the harmony of God’s own nature, and carry life forward through a lineage rooted in him. God, in this understanding, possesses dual characteristics — a harmony of masculine and feminine, internal and external — and human beings are made to embody and reflect that harmony in the union of husband and wife. The love of man and woman is not merely a biological arrangement but the very place where God’s love is meant to be fully realised and multiplied, as a couple centred on God becomes the origin of a God-centred family. On this created pattern, see the three blessings of Genesis 1:28 and the dual characteristics of God.
This gives the whole subject a hopeful and non-condemning shape. Because the Fall distorted human love at its root — introducing a lineage and a nature out of line with God’s design — every one of us inherits desires and patterns that do not match the original ideal, and the work of restoration is to bring love and lineage back into their created order. In that light, no person’s struggle is an exception or a scandal; it is one instance of the universal task of restoring love to God’s design. The Divine Principle honours the deep human longing for love as good and God-given, and directs it toward the purpose for which love was made. On why lineage stands at the centre of this, see why lineage is central to salvation and God’s plan of restoration.
How to walk this faithfully
For the person wrestling with these questions, the way forward is the same path of discipleship that every believer walks: offering the whole self to God, living in honest community, and trusting that his design is for our good even when it is costly. This is not a trivial ask, and it should never be presented as though it were. Many Christians who experience same-sex attraction have found, in surrendering their sexuality to God alongside every other area of life, not deprivation but a deep and settled peace — while others carry an ongoing struggle with patience and faith. Both are walking faithfully. What makes the difference is not the absence of difficulty but the presence of God and of a community that bears the weight together. On what sustains that kind of discipleship, see what spiritual disciplines are.
For the church, the counsel is just as clear: hold honesty and love together and never trade one for the other. That means telling the truth about God’s design without a hint of contempt, and welcoming the person who is struggling more warmly than anywhere else would. People do not change under condemnation; they open up under love that is safe enough to be honest with. A believer burdened by shame over desires they did not choose needs, first, to hear that they are loved, that temptation is not transgression, and that God’s design is an invitation into life rather than a sentence against them. On lifting that particular weight, see what the Bible says about guilt and shame, and on the responsibility each of us carries in our own restoration, see the human portion of responsibility.
Frequently asked questions
Is experiencing same-sex attraction a sin?
Scripture names homosexual acts, not involuntary attraction, among the things that fall short of God’s design. Many Christians draw a careful distinction between an attraction a person did not choose to feel and a desire that is consciously nursed and acted upon. Being tempted is not itself the sin; Jesus himself was tempted and remained without sin. What Scripture asks of every person, whatever their attractions, is that they offer their whole life, including their sexuality, into God’s design and care.
What does the Bible actually say about homosexuality?
A handful of passages across the Old and New Testaments (for example Leviticus 18:22, Romans 1:26–27 and 1 Corinthians 6:9–10) address homosexual practice, and the historic reading of these texts is that such acts fall outside God’s design for sexual union between a man and a woman in marriage. At the same time the same Scriptures place these among a long list of human failings and insist that God loves every person and desires their restoration, never their condemnation.
Does God love people who experience same-sex attraction?
Yes, completely and without reservation. The Bible is clear that every human being is made in God’s image and has sacred worth, and that God’s desire for each person is life and restoration through his love. A person’s attractions never change their value to God or their welcome into his family. Shaming or rejecting anyone on the basis of their sexuality contradicts the heart of God, who draws near to everyone he made.
How does the Divine Principle view sexuality?
The Divine Principle teaches that God created human beings as man and woman so that their love could complete God’s purpose of creation, carry life forward through a lineage rooted in God, and reflect the harmony of God’s own dual characteristics. Sexuality is therefore treated as sacred and purposeful rather than trivial, the place where love, family and lineage meet. Within that frame every person’s longing for love is honoured, and the call is to bring that longing into alignment with God’s original design.
How should the church respond to people with same-sex attraction?
With honesty and love held together, never traded against each other. That means telling the truth about God’s design while refusing every form of contempt, mockery or exclusion. People wrestling honestly with their sexuality need friendship, patience and a community that walks with them, not a verdict delivered from a distance. The church is at its best when the person who is struggling feels more loved there than anywhere else, and more free to be honest there than anywhere else.